Ghûlheim

[Tramp]

Ghouls do not build. They are parasites and scavengers, eaters of carrion. The city they call Ghûlheim is something they found, long ago, but did not make. No one they call knows (if anyone human ever knew) what kind of creatures it was that made those buildings, who honeycombed the rock with tunnels and towers, but it is certain that no-one but the ghoul-folk could have wanted to stay there, or even to approach that place.

Even from the path below Ghûlheim, even from miles away, Bod could see that all of the angles were wrong -- that the walls sloped crazily, that it was every nightmare he had ever endured made into a place, like a huge mouth of jutting teeth. It was a city that had been built just to be abandoned, in which all the fears and madnesses and revulsions of the creatures who built it were made into stone. The ghoul folk had found it and delighted in it and called it home.

A dark and disjointed scent: smoke and black musk, bladderwrack, opopponax, galangal, and pepper.

Clove cigarettes and sticky club floors. Curling smoke with a hint of cola sweetness. Smells surprisingly good on my skin. But then I like clove cigs and sticky cola. Dripping fatty candlewax is in there too. This is really well blended.

[sookster]

tramp's review is spot on!!!

 

straight sniff from imp is flat coke...no fizz and lots of black musk...

 

once applied there is hot, spiciness to this...it reacts very well with my chemistry

and stays sweet and musky...and sticky waxy....

[forspecial_plate]

I love this! It's a bit hard to describe, and I don't remember smelling anything quite like it. I couldn't say exactly which notes I'm picking up. It's a quiet scent, dark, brooding.....kind of thrumming. There is something nearly soapy about it, but in a good way, not an obnoxious way. The closest thing I can think of is Djinn, but this is much quieter, and even darker if you can imagine that. I just really like it, and I wish I could describe it better, but I may end up with more than a decant somewhere down the line.

 

Edit: after reading the description again, I wanted to say that I wouldn't call this disjointed at all. It seems unified and expertly blended to me. Opinions will vary, I'm sure!

Edited December 9, 2008 by Forspecial Plate

[Coldfire]

Decant: dark…dark musky pepper

Wet On Me: sweet musky pepper

Drying Down: Smoke and Musky pepper

Dry: The smokey is gone. It’s a nice darker musk

with trace pepper undertones. Not too bad.

[rayvn1]

Not bad. A little spicy, a little dark. For such strong notes it's a pretty subtle blend. Nothing really comes to the foreground though it's been lingering on my arm for several hours.

[voodoocatwoman]

Thankfully I do not get the smoke that others have mentioned. This scent is primarily a spicy musk on me. Dark, rich and cozy. It is nice and will be relegated to the "winter" blends.

[Little Bird]

I like this in the bottle where it smells like a clean, dark cologne and gorgeous black pepper. On my skin, Ghulheim just morphs into something odd, though. It smells like flat cola and spicy breakfast sausages . Smoked, spiced meat. In the drydown, the cola-y sweetness starts to smell like maple syrup on me, which just makes me even more unable to get rid of the impression of breakfast sausages.

 

This is not a keeper for me.

[crebbsgirl]

Ok, something went incredibly funky on my skin here and no joke - this turned into Eau de Gas Station on my wrists. Oh how I wish I were kidding, but there was UNMISTAKEABLY the scent of gas and oil on my skin. It settled down after about an hour (I can be pretty determined with perfume and I try to give everything the benefit of the doubt) and I got a spiced musk, but there was still hints of funkiness underneath. No, this was definitely not for me.

[smokey188]

Smokey and earthy not too strong. Sadly staying power isn't really enough for me to pay the extra but this is the only thing I don't love about this.

[tartchef]

Wow. Ghulheim is a dead ringer for the occult/hippy shop I used to frequent in high school... sweet, spicy incense smoke, but with a slap of soapiness from the occasional musk/jasmine/rose stick they'd burn. I can see where folks might get cola & lime, but alas, the black musk is riding roughshod over any thing remotely tasty.

[catatonic1242]

In the imp: Oddly, this reminds me a lot of Dragon's Claw, even though they don't have any listed notes in common. This is dark and musky and kind of dry.

 

On, wet: Musk and powder. I wish I was getting the cola that a lot of others have gotten.

 

On, dry: Holy moly, this changes a lot from wet to dry. It's all pepper and herbs on me now, with maybe the lightest touch of something soapy. It really is "dark and disjointed."

[zankoku_zen]

It is that hippie shop incense with hints of Coke/soda and a blast of lime.

 

Smells like chill times and hanging out, when life stretched out forever in front of you, and all you needed were friends, good music and a 2 liter of Coke to have a good time.

 

ETA: A little too masculine for me, but I'll be intrigued to try this on the hubby.

Edited March 13, 2009 by zankoku_zen

[mochi227]

From a decant circle during my love affair with smoke scents (which hasn't entirely ended as the note works well on me), Ghulheim on me isn't as dark and disjointed as the description promises. I get the cola scent as others have, and the pepper and the musk, but it smells more unified than disjointed to me. It's a slightly spicy, slightly sweet scent on me, like a Coke and Absolut Peppar cocktail. The Black Musk reminds me of some of the oils I used to buy from Muslim oil vendors on the streets of NYC. The whole thing reminds me a bit of high school, the cola smell, the sweetness, the stickyness, like a group of slightly deviant adolescents went out to the woods to get drunk on rum & coke, did some pyromaniac things like burn books, and smoked cloves and wore cheap musk oil while doing so. I guess that's a bit ghoulish.

 

Will use up my decant and leave it at that. 3 out of 5.

[Saya]

Spicy, smokey, dark and thick. This is a heavy blend that is too much for my nose. I'll be passing this imp along.

[missastro]

Strangely sharp, feels almost carbonated. This is high pitched, sour root beer on me. Yuck.

[ralenth]

Source: Lab bottle aged since release (September 2008)

 

Ghûlheim is a swirling dark musk,with soft hints of clove and pepper. Aging has mellowed this bottle significantly from my initial sniffs. It seems dark, sexy and wearable. Initially, I couldn't get this far enough away, but now it's quite lovely.

[LizziesLuck]

Wet: Dark, rich. Sweet, smoky and spicy. I quite enjoy it so far. It's very smooth. It gives an "aged" feel, even though this decant is brand new from a circle. Really well blended. Liking this a lot more than I expected. There's something rather comforting about it.

 

 

Dry: Really interesting. It smells like nighttime, outside - in a way. The kind of night that things lurk in. I like it. I think it needs some age before its true beauty comes out. Not sure I need a bottle, but happy to keep the decant and see how it ages!

[Rane.]

This one is a sexy red dress smell on me. In the bottle it had a rubbery note to it that was strange. But once I smeared some on it turned into a sweet, Indian incense, smoke, & musk smell. Galangal & opoponax have to be what creates that sultry scent. My favorite thing about this is my wife said she didn't like the bottle smell, but she couldn't stop smelling me after I put some on! 💖

[Tungerine]

This shares a lot of notes with Old Demons of the First Class, which is why I got it. At first I thought it was very similar, but I think I didn't let it settle long enough because it's more different to Old Demons now. There are still obviously notes in common, but it's much lighter, smoother, and somehow... slimier. Yes, it's slimy. Not aquatic, slimy. Like algae-covered rocks. Like bladderwrack, in fact, but nicer than real bladderwrack. It's also less musky than Old Demons and the galangal adds some light sweetness. It probably sounds bad from my description but it's actually amazing. I love it.

Edited April 8 by Tungerine